Meet the Long Island native who won the Islanders' third jersey fan vote

James Doyle submitted six designs in the Islanders’ fan contest to design their third jersey for the 2027-28 season.

He was set on having the lighthouse as the primary logo on the jersey, too, with all but one of his submissions featuring it.

“I just feel like it’s really Long Island,” the 22-year-old Elmont native told Newsday.

Well, Doyle wasn’t alone in his support of the lighthouse. More than 37,000 of the 80,490 submissions featured a lighthouse, according to the Islanders. But the design that capitalized on a 0.001% chance to emerge atop them all? That would be Doyle’s.

Doyle is the creator of the Islanders’ new navy lighthouse jersey, the team announced Thursday. He found out he would be one of eight finalists a day before the Islanders released their eight-jersey bracket for fan voting on Aug. 11, and it’s been a whirlwind since.

“It’s been wild,” Doyle said. “I can’t believe all this happened so fast. Because when they came out with the contest, I was just messing around . . . The next thing you know, I wake up and the Islanders are posting my face. It’s crazy, my backstory.”

That backstory includes a deep personal connection to the Islanders amid what has been a difficult year.

“Well, I’ve been a fan my whole life,” he said. “I’ve been growing up watching the Islanders. I’ve been a diehard fan. I watch every game. My dad was a big fan, too, and he passed away earlier this year. So it’s just been a crazy year.”

When he finally learned he won the contest — a fact he discovered at the same time as everyone else when the Islanders posted on social media on Aug. 20 — was he thinking about his dad?

“Yeah,” Doyle said. “I was just thinking about how he’d probably be going crazy right now.”

Doyle, who lives a few minutes from UBS Arena, will receive a team-signed third jersey and tickets to the game in which the jersey makes its debut.

In a statement last Thursday, Islanders president of business operations Kelly Cheeseman said: “This contest was launched to break down traditional barriers, giving the fans a direct voice in shaping our new look. We are excited to move forward and create the full uniform that our fan base will be proud to call theirs.”

Like many other Islanders fans, Doyle believed the lighthouse was the best option because he “felt like we should have a different logo entirely.” The lighthouse was worn as a shoulder patch on the Islanders’ controversial fisherman jerseys in the 1990s, but it never had been a primary logo.

When he learned his design was among the eight final choices, he initially thought he was being scammed. While he obviously was rooting for his design once the voting started, he was “trying to keep it fair” and voted only once for himself. But Doyle’s family members voted on several different emails to help his design win.

“I wasn’t telling everybody to go vote for me,” he said. “I told a couple friends. My family knew. But my family members did most of the work because I’m kind of a shy person, so I didn’t want too much attention with it. Obviously, now it’s crazy.”

Doyle said that seeing the players repost the jersey on social media “doesn’t even feel real” and “it’s so weird” that they are aware of his existence.

His favorite player is one he and many Islanders fans share: Matthew Schaefer. And he’ll eventually see the rising superstar wear his jersey.

“That hasn’t set in,” Doyle said. “It probably won’t set in until I see him wear it, which is — it’s just going to be an unreal experience seeing it.”

By Ben Dickson

benjamin.dickson@newsday.com@bendickson__

Ben Dickson is Newsday Sports' general assignment reporter. He joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.